20XX is a action platformer developed by ‘BatteryStaple Games‘. It’s coming out on the Xbox One the 11th of July, PS4 and Nintendo Switch the 10th of July but already out on PC. Now 20XX has been heavily inspired by Mega Man and it’s clear but do they have more to offer? let’s take a look.
There isn’t much of a story in 20XX. Basically players are fighting to save the human race (maybe). We say maybe because that what the developers keep putting after that sentence. So are we the good guys? What’s really going on here? Guess you’ll have to play to find out. Just like Mega Man X players must run, jump, shoot and blast their way through enemies and levels. 20XX does offer gamers a bit more though.
20XX is also rougelike. You know what that means. Yes, the levels are all random and always changing. 20XX uses procedural level generation algorithm that combines different game mechanics to also change how players handle each level. Some levels will have more emphasis on combat while another may be heavy in platforming like timing jumps. The more difficult ones will be the combination of heavy platforming and dangerous combat.
Like any good rough like game there are many power ups and all are random as well. There are over 100 power ups. As you play through 20XX players will earn soul chips, which can be used to expand the pool of items you can find and get powerful upgrades which are permanent. You can also buy upgrades back at your HQ to make future runs easier. By way did we mention ‘die’?
Dying is the last thing you want to do in 20XX (duh) because there is permanent death too. Once you die, yes you go back to HQ for the opportunity to buy upgrades but you will have to start again. Like Spelunky. It gets better. Players have the options of playing different modes and there are difficulty modifiers too. So like with the skulls in Halo players can really change up the game to some extend to make things easier or super challenging.
20XX’s biggest feature and the thing that gets people’s attention is it’s multiplayer. Yep. Full co-op for all gameplay features both locally and online. So get that gaming couch out and call that friend over. You have some blasting and jumping to do together. Lastly to keep things flowing and give players objectives there are weekly and daily challenges.
We checked out some gameplay and it’s what we thought it would be. We do love the power ups though. like the sharp sharp spear which has more range and damage. The Pollster boss looks simple and dumb at first but then things escalate real fast with him killing first time players almost too quickly. It’s all good and done very well. 20XX definitely got the Mega Man look and feeling down and as it’s more modern looks like it did a better job than Mega Man its self.
Overall 20XX looks like an awesome game. If you are a fan of Mega Man then you will love 20XX. The graphics and sounds are excellent. The game flows smoothly and the controls are said to be very good indeed. The level designs are quite clever with platforming, enemies and even traps. The developers ‘BatteryStaple Games’ did an fantastic job with this game. We at X345 Earthwalker look forward to seeing this come to consoles. Now 20XX may have been inspired but way more have been inspired by… the ‘Earth Walk!’
No Man’s Sky has come a long way from it’s initial release. Firstly, No Man’s sky is finally coming to Xbox One the 24th of July 2018. It’s also coming to the WeGame which is a platform in China. Many hate this game and the developers, ‘Hello Games‘ but just grow up for a moment and listen to what we have to say and show you. Let’s take a look.
No Man’s Sky has been adding many updates and lots of new content which they said it would have. No Man’s Sky has had three major updates: Foundation, Pathfinder and Atlas Rises. Atlas Rises was the biggest and the most successful. it brought forth a new story. It’s said to have 30 hours worth of new story content such as a new inter dimensional race, ancient portals are being activated, the amount of lore and interactions got doubled, a waking Titan, a world of glass, mysteries like the meaning of Sixteen, the sentinels and more. Improved waypoint systems, better inventory management, new worlds, guilds, salvage missions and crashed giant freighter ships, missions agents, combined crafted products and much more. Literally if we listed them all it could take up the whole blog. They put in work to make this the largest game to date… but wait… there’s more.
When No Man’s Sky comes to the Xbox One it will automatically have the last three updates: Foundation, Pathfinder and Atlas rises… plus a new and biggest update they have been secretly working on: No Man’s Sky Next. That’s right, they aren’t done! Listen to this. No Man’s Sky Next will be a FREE update for PC and PS4 (as it’s already released on those). As we mentioned above, yes it’s launching on Xbox One as well but with 4K and HDR on the Xbox One X. No Man’s Sky Next will have full fledge multiplayer. You encounter random travellers. You can work together or attack them. Build shelters or big complexes together. Fight like pirates or work together like being a distraction in big space battles. You can even race exocrafts and even build your race tracks online.
So remember how big the game was, in terms of size, when it first released? Now imagine it’s bigger, with a actual story, missions, quests, guilds, complexes, space battles, racing, multiplayer, crews travelling, other players chasing you for your loot, many creatures and more. Yep, sounds like a serious game now doesn’t it? There has also been a ton of patches as well. Here are some:
Increased variety in weather, planet and structure names
Improved differentiation of weapons
Improved planet resource lists
Added freighter classes
Added new holographic cockpit HUD elements: mini map, pulse drive warning and target ship
New Gek, Vy’keen and Korvax medals
Improved pirate systems including the ability to call in support or negotiate
Trust us when we say there is much much more than these.
Overall it looks like no Man’s Sky is much different from what it use to be. They added in many things like they said they would. With the ‘next’ update coming as well, it looks like this could be a huge game that many will jump into across all platforms. The graphics and sounds have been improved too. The developers ‘Hello Games’ have done an excellent job. We at X35 Earthwalker are actually saying that we are looking forward to seeing what this game has to offer. Now No Man’s Sky might be very large, but it’s no where near as big as… the ‘Earth Walk!’
NeiR: Automata is an action RPG developed by ‘Square Enix‘. It is coming out on the Xbox One the 26th of June but already out on PC and PS4. NeiR: Automata has already gotten loads of positive feedback and reviews. Let’s take a look.
NeiR: Automata is very futuristic. Basically humanity has been forced from earth by robots, from another planet, who have invaded. These mechanical beings struck without warning. So the humans fell back to the moon for refuge. Humanities response is to send android soldiers to fight and destroy these invaders and get earth back. These android soldiers are: android 2B. 9S and A2.
NeiR: Automata boasts of having no are loading. So players can just go from area to area with no delay which is really cool. All the environments have sub-events giving players more to do and it’s all in 60frames per second. once again NeiR: Automata reminds us of a Final Fantasy XV which is another excellent game.
As NeiR: Automata is an RPG expect those players can customise a loadout for different play styles, level up in combat, collect and use a variety of weapon types and off course learn new combat abilities. So players should be aware of what to expect on their play through.
We can confirm that the combat is really where this game shines as it’s deep but not too complex. You can execute high-speed battle actions by combining light and heavy attacks, plus swapping through your increasing arsenal of weaponry all while evading enemy attacks. Players will face bosses and hordes of enemies so style has to change from time time, like switching between melee and ranged attacks. Expect fluid action combat.
When it comes on the Xbox One, players can get the ‘Become as gods edition’ which supports 4K resolution (2160P) and HDR on Xbox One X. It also includes the 3C3C1D119440927 DLC which contains the Young man’s outfit for 9S, Destroyer outfit for A2 and the Revealing outfit for 2B. Special music video “Deserving of life”. Sub quests which are three different battle challenges at three different colosseums.
We checked out some gameplay and we can confirm that it looks awesome. The mechanical beings that invaded earth have a good variety of designs. The combat is fast and fluid indeed. Loads of abilities, ranged attacks and moves to extend combos like sliding into enemies to send them into the air. Massive and powerful bosses. The environments are designed very well and look excellent. Strange and questionable in-game philosophy though. The android soldiers do not look all that interesting but they are powerful.
Overall NeiR: Automata looks very good indeed and it’s a start for us to see why it got such high praises and reviews from many. When it does come to the Xbox, we at X35 Earthwalker will see what it truly has to offer. The developers ‘Square Enix’ did a fantastic job with this game. Now Earth is off course in trouble but one thing that’s never in trouble is… the ‘Earth Walk!’
Streets of Rage is one of those games that many played back in the day on the Sega Genesis. X35 Earthwalker himself was one of those who played this legendary game. Quite recently Streets of Rage was made available on the Xbox One. This was the perfect invitation to play the game again. So what do we think about it? Take a look.
Streets of Rage gets straight to the point. The slowly scrolling text explains the whole situation quickly and simply. Basically a city is full of chaos because of a criminal syndicate who controls everything, even the police. The leader is Mr X and he’s caused villains and crime to sky rocket. No one is safe (Will someone please think of the children!). Three cops vowed to work take to the streets, clean it up by romping all the villains trash with their fists and put a stop to all this evil. They will clean up… the Streets of Rage. You’ll never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy.
Remember that this game came out in 1991 so you have to accept how simple it is. Players can pick from three characters: Adam, Axel and Blaze. Their stats are displayed simply with a ‘A to B’ ranking system for three categories: Power, Jump and Speed. Power is how much damage they do, Jump is how high they jump and how good their jump attacks are and Speed is how fast their movement is. Now Adam and Axel do the most damage. Adam and Blaze have the best jumping attacks and height. Overall Adam is the strongest character as he excels in the two categories that actually matter. Blaze will there for be the weakest but streets of Rage has been designed in a way that all three characters are still useful, feel different from each other and can beat the game with skill.
Adam is a boxer and so his attacks are more simple and rely on his strength. Axel is a martial artist so his attacks are quicker and more technical. Blaze does Judo so her throws rely on those use your opponents weight against them, plus she does some cool flip attacks. Each of the characters can grab and throw enemies or grab and slam the enemy on their head by lifting them completely of the ground. All can grab and land powerful strikes which best to follow up with a throw after two strikes for maximum damage. All have a jumping attack which is useful against rushing enemies or groups of enemies in a line. All also have a rear attack which basically lets your character quickly do a strike behind them to hit whoever is dumb enough to sneak up on you. Lastly all can call in a powerful artillery strike from a fellow police officer which defeats all enemies on the screen but just damages bosses.
There are eight stages to clear and each one is littered with lots of enemies. The enemies are simple but do their job. There are the standard dudes who can hit you with the simple right, right, left jabs. There’s a guy who like to throw you and at times slide into you smoother than M. Bison from Street fighter. Also a woman who thinks it’s funny to whip people. A martial martial artist who specialises in flips and kicks. Lastly a juggler who juggles fire, axes and then throws them at you (what a neat trick). It gets worse. As you progress through the Streets of Rage, you will encounter improved versions of the enemies you have faced so far. So the standard blue jacket dudes then become green and then red. The throwing guys get purple and then green outfits. The whipping women find black and lastly green clothing for the occasion. The martial artists graded up to having red and then a cool black and red uniform. Lastly the jugglers just find some alright black clothes. The improved versions have more health and more aggressive as they attack more frequently.
Each stage also has a boss who can be a serious threat. Stage one is where you face the boomerang hunter (we are giving them our own names) who has a lengthy kick and throws his boomerang which of course comes back, so watch out. Stage two is the domain of the claw hands man, basically a wannabe Fredy Kruger who is has a crazy technique to avoid jump attacks. Third stage is where the wrestler is, who does heavy damage with a running single punch. The fat man boss is hanging out in stage four. They breathe fire and forget about throwing this big boy. Stage five just so happens to have the twins who were enjoying their cruise. They are over powered. Stage six the hand claw man makes a return. Stage 7 has no boss but stage 8 has every boss you have encountered already, all ready for the rematch with off course the final boss, Mr X himself waiting and ready.
Bosses are seen by many as too hard and unfair. This is mainly due to the fact that almost all of them almost always hit you first due to their greater range and fast attack speed. It’s true. if you take these bosses head on, they will mostly likely kill you first. The best trick is to approach them from they sides by coming in from higher or lower on the screen. This will allow you to dodge many attacks and even allow a free grab on the boss themselves for big damage. Players should call in their police officer when they are needed. Don’t just save it for the boss at the end because if you die, that police call is wasted and you’ll get a new one. If you get surrounded or having a hard time against mob of enemies then use your police call ability to clear them out. It’s there to help you. Don’t just grab every health item you see. Instead go as far as possible while keeping the food on screen, their may be a fight next, where you take damage and now the food is useful. Also save the meat that at the boss fights until you are low on health. Bats and pipes are useful weapons and should never be passed up. The knife is also good but the bottle, not so much.
Maybe the best thing about Streets of Rage is the music. We are sure that pretty much everyone can agree that the music is amazing. Like seriously, who was the guy working in the studio. He clearly had too much fun. The boss music might just have to be our favourite but the music on level four is too smooth. The music is awesome. The controls are good and work very well allowing for reactions and quick actions. The bosses are creative and difficult without the right knowledge.
We have a few complaints though. The twins however are the most overpowered bosses in the game and even good players struggle tremendously against them. When it comes to stage eight, many players and have fallen to them right outside Mr X’s doors. It’s frustrating, especially when you don’t have the police call ability to help you out. They have no clear weakness at all. They always out grab you, they at times grab you through your attacks or at the start of their jump. Last complaint is why do you still have to face both the sisters even in single player. Everyone other stage sends one boss against the one player but the sisters always come together making it a two on one battle. It should be one on one like with all the others but it’s still a challenge though.
Overall Streets of Rage is an awesome game and certainly worth playing today. You will have lots of fun fighting your way through the streets, trying out different combos. There are some hidden tricks in the Streets of Rage games that players will have to discover. We also heard that their is a secret ending for Blaze but it’s a bad ending. We won’t spoil anything but it’s worth checking out. Now the Streets of Rage needed to be cleaned up but one thing that doesn’t need cleaning up at all is… the ‘Earth Walk!’
Edge of Eternity is a new action J-RPG developed by ‘Midgar Studio‘. It’s coming out later this year (2018) on the Xbox One, PS4, PC, Mac and Linux. Edge of eternity was funded through Kickstarter by many supporters. Let’s take a look.
Edge of Eternity takes place in Heryon. Heryon was, as with every other place in video games and anime, a peaceful world. There are also three realms: Dehostra, Astrya and Junor. Each of these realms have the same access to magic powers through crystals. So it’s clear that this world is about balance. Then off course trouble comes along. Invaders in a massive spaceship appeared above Junor and destroyed everything and took possession of the realm.
Reynan who is the grand General of Dehostra’s armies was in command of the defence of Heryon. He formed the consortium and led the counter attack. The consortium got the upper hand and was pushing the invaders back. All the way to their spaceship. Their ship transformed into an invincible fortress. The general and his forces couldn’t break through. The invaders then cheated by releasing a deadly biological weapon, called the metal disease. The war continues still. Players control Daryon who is wanted and hunted by the consortium.
Edge of Eternity has character progression and is all about exploration. There are a lot of large open areas and many locations on the world map for players to dive into. Edge of Eternity gives players two choices concerning the combat system. You can either have active time battle or turn base. The fact that Edge of Eternity is giving players a choice is awesome. We at X35 Earthwalker already node in agreement of this decision. Nice one! The combat in this game has an event system which even takes into account factors like the time of day and the weather. Depending on the time and weather, either your team or enemies will gain advantages or suffer from it. Your team can have up to four characters allowing room for experimenting with combinations and strategies.
So as a J-RPG, best there is character progression with experience points and increasing sats but Edge of Eternity takes it further by adding another layer. There is a weapon customisation system too. It’s based on two things: crystals and levelling up. As you fight with your weapon, you it will eventually level up thus getting more powerful and even evolving. The crystal side of things is different as it’s here where players can choose which branch to go along and the different crystals grant different effects like stats, skills and powers. When you take a look at the crystal system, the first thing that may come to your mind is the levelling up system from final fantasy XIII and XIII-2. It’s practically identical.
Edge of Eternity is said to have an adventure that responds to your choices. Your characters effect have a direct impact on each area they visit so keep that in mind. The story is said to be non-linear and that players and choose and their own paths. There are many quests, people to talk, different options and even random events that will take place.
We checked out some gameplay and Edge of Eternity looks amazing. The graphics, size of the whole and environments remind us heavily of Final Fantasy, which is a good thing as those are great games. Lots of work clearly went into this and their is potential for more too. Some of the enemies look too large and powerful while others are clearly fodder. The running animation for the characters does look silly though. The lighting and different spells and abilities look very cool. The music is very well done and at times epic. This team has been putting in work.
Overall, Edge of Eternity looks like an awesome game. They have so much going for it right and there is a good amount of well deserved hype. We hope this game takes a different direction in terms of story from other games concerning certain characters and enemies. The developers ‘Midgar Studio’ did a fantastic job with this game. We at X35 Earthwalker are looking forward to seeing what Edge of Eternity has to fully offer. Now Heryon is in trouble but the perfect solution would be… the ‘Earth Walk!’
Super Bomberman R is a action maze game developed by ‘Konami‘ and Hexadrive. It is coming out on Xbox One and PS4 the 14th of June and the 13th of June on PC but already out on Nintendo switch. This game is said to have more bombs and fun. Let’s take a look.
Many gamers know Bomberman. Either from the days of the Sega genesis or more recent titles like Bomber battlefest. Bomberman is all about indestructible Bombermen who get together and have a blast using bombs and other explosives. Yes they do have a story like stopping dangerous enemies who either split the planet into pieces or collecting the bomb element crystals. This latest title Super Bomberman R is said to be ‘Lit’.
Super Bomberman R has the return of the famous bomber men but now there are 8 Bomberman bros: White, Black, Pink, Blue, Red, Yellow, Aqua and green. Each having their own unique personality and silly traits. They are up against their arch nemesis, Buggler who is out to destroy the universe, which is a very dumb plan. He doesn’t want to rule the universe but destroy it? So wouldn’t he die too? Anyway, he has with him the 5 Dastardly bombers who are a group of powerful bombermen who have very interesting powers. The story mode is interesting as of right now.
The multiplayer however; is what we all know Bomberman for. Battle mode has the traditional game mode of last man standing basically. So destroy the others and the be the sole survivor to win. There are 19 different stages to battle on and but it has been made clear that Super bomberman R got even more maps which are said to make matches unpredictable.
Along with the additional maps there are a bunch of new characters as well like: Simon Belmont Bomber, Goemon Bomber, Dracula Bomber, Pyramid head Bomber, Aubis Bomber and more. each having their own special ability which will certainly mix things up on the battlefield. This reminds us of a Play Station 1 Bomber game where some characters had special abilities like shooting flames, detonating bombs with bullets, dashing by rockets etc. It adds layers to matches.
Lastly Super Bomber R gets Grand Prix mode which according to Konami is made for future esports initiatives. It’s basically a package of match types made for 3v3 competitive gameplay. One of the modes is crystal matches where the two teams must collect crystals to score gain points but off course getting hit by a bomb will cause players to lose half of their crystals.
We checked out some gameplay and so far it looks cool. The High high bandits are here and still causing trouble. The boss battles with the 5 dastardly bombers are definitely epic. For example Magnet Bomber isn’t a pushover as he is quite fast, got multiple bombs and his magnet bombs will follow you for a period of time through magnetism. The story mode have over 50 levels. In Battle mode, the biggest flavour comes from the different stages which have different environments and map elements. Everything so far looks real cool. just how they draw some of the bombermen poses do look a little lame, even for a children’s style game.
Overall Super Bomberman R is a very cool game. The graphics are great and the music is great too. The voices and animations are funny and works well for this style. The campaign can be done in co-op two players while Battle mode can have up to 8 players. We just hope they bring in more game types for multiplayer as that’s a solid advantage that Bomberman Battlefest had. The developers ‘Konami’ and ‘Hexadrive’ did a excellent job. We at X35 Earthwalker are looking forward to playing Super Bomberman R. Now bombermen have a blast but nothing is more fun than… the ‘Earth Walk!’
Shift Quantum is a new action puzzle platformer game developed by ‘Fishing Cactus‘. It’s coming out the 29th of May on the Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, PS4 and PC but coming out the 30th of May in the United Kingdom. This game is expected to really engage player’s brains. Let’s take a look.
The story of Shift Quantum isn’t exactly that clear or written well at all but basically someone called Axon Vertigo promises to bring about better life quality for everyone using the Shift Quantum program. All puzzles in this game are meant to force players to think in different and specific ways. The players task is to solve puzzles. There’s more. You must transform barriers into escape routes by creating negative space. Get to the exit to get exactly what you’ve been promised by Axon Vertigo… happiness.
Players need to keep an eye on the whole environment and Shift Quantum world. This is because you have the option to twist the environment and shift the world. Make use of all special gameplay blocks to overcome obstacles and get to the exit to find the happiness you have been searching for and promised by Axon Vertigo.
Players also have the opportunity to create their own levels as well. Adding the different blocks and areas that change gravity direction and off course making obvious places that can only be traversed through the shifting mechanic.
Since it’s also a puzzle game, expect the difficulty to be amped up. players will have to stop and think how they can complete the level, what is needed and what order should these things be done. Eventually timing will be brought into the equation too.
We checked out some gameplay of Shift Quantum and it does look very cool. The animations are good. The level designs are excellent. The negative space mechanic looks awesome as your character literally gos through the stage to the other side and things flip around the the colours become negative. The black and white visuals work well with this game. The puzzles are certainly worthy of the name ‘puzzles’. Shift Quantum comes of as very unique.
Overall Shift Quantum is a very cool game. The graphics and visuals are very good. The sounds are just good. The level designs are excellent. The developers ‘Fishing Cactus’ did an excellent job with this game. We at X35 Earthwalker look forward to seeing how other gamers take to this game.
Moonlighter is a new action RPG game with some rouge-lite elements developed by ‘Digital Sun‘. It’s coming out the 29th of May on the Xbox One, PS4 and PC. It will also come out on the Nintendo Switch in 2018 but not exactly sure when. This action RPG looks real cool. Let’s take a look.
In the world of Moonlighter, players take control of a shopkeeper. That’s right, a shopkeeper who goes out daily to collect items for his shop. Who longs to go on a great adventure and be known as a hero. Looks like he’ll finally get his chance. Some gates were discovered during a archeological excavation which took place a long time ago. A small commercial village called Rynoka was founded near this same excavation site. Rynoka provided a place for adventurers to temporarily stay and sell the items and treasures they found. The people, including the shop keeper learnt that the ancient passages lead to different realms and dimensions.
As a shopkeeper, players must manage shop. This means handling the shop finances, putting items on for sale and also setting their prices. Players can upgrade the shop, kind of like in Animal Crossing with Tom nooks shop. Make sure to also hire shop assistants. Like with a real store, you must be careful as some people might try to steal your stuff. Why can’t people be decent? So as you can see, it’s not just going out and adventuring but also handling a shop on a daily basis.
Like the shop, the village is loaded with different people in Moonlighter. Getting to know the villagers is essential as they reveal their needs as a customer. so the right information can help increase sales. Some villagers have big requests, requiring rare items that players have to seek out and bring back and in return that villager will pay you very generously. Also it’s with the villagers that players can do crafting to get new armour, weapons and even enchant certain items. Kind of reminds you of Minecraft.
As mentioned before, there are many gates which lead to different dimensions and realms. This means they can take players anywhere, which means players must be prepared for everything, so carry equipment and items that covers a range of needs. The enemies vary greatly as well and that’s one thing Moonlighter so far does well, which is variety. Variety is very important for gamers. It was something the new God of War lacked with their bosses. Fighting a similar troll monster multiple times.
Do not forget. Amongst all the fighting and exploring, the main thing is to collect loot. Grab everything! Treasures, artifacts, valuable resources, armours and weapons. It’s all fair game. Not only that some found loot could be used to make you more powerful but you can also put some of these up in the store for the villagers and customers to buy and keep your shop alive and running smoothly.
Off course, the enemies and bosses are not going to let us just walk around and grab all this loot. They need to be handled. Now Moonlighter has quite a surprisingly deep combat mechanics. All this combat depends on the interaction between enemies, weapons, secondary effects of items and abilities. So players need to get creative, find their own combat styles. Before you know it, players will invent their own combos and flow of actions. Not every enemy can be handled the same way.
We checked out some gameplay. Moonlighter firstly has some smooth animations for movement and combat. There are truly different enemies. some are squishy while others are hard and roll up into a ball. Use a bow and arrow, a bigger broadsword and more. Many items and abilities to use like instant escapes, gap leaping, blocking with shields, healing and much more. Even the history of the character is quite engaging. You can relate to the whole subject of putting duty and responsibilities first.
Overall Moonlighter is a very cool game. The story behind it all is very good and will relate to many gamers. The combat mechanics are quite deep and provide many options for players. the graphics are not that great for it’s style. the sounds and music are very good indeed. It’s creative how this game is designed. The developers ‘Digital Sun’ did a excellent job with this game. We at X35 Earthwalker look forward to seeing Moonlighter come out. Now not every adventure pays off but one thing that always pays off is… the ‘Earth Walk!’
Pac-Man Championship Edition 2 is just all fun. lots of fun. we have to start off by saying that. If you are a fan of Pac-Man or maybe played Pac-Man before, then you have to try this. Honestly there is no excuse, as there is even a demo for gamers to try and see how mad it is for themselves.
Imagine the original Pac-Man. Good. Then times that action by three. Now you sort of have Pac-Man Championship Edition 2. It’s so colourful and has modern written all over it. Neon lights, flashing lights, solid colours and some unique patterns. When you start the game what hits you before the visuals most likely would be the music. It’s loud, it’s pumping and got a beat. Pac-Man Championship Edition 2 has lots of great music for players to jam to while they are taking on levels. A bit more on the music later.
Pac-Man Championship Edition 2 has primarily two game modes: Score attack and Adventure. it sounds small but when you get into it, it’s much deeper than you initially think. Score attack is pretty much where the main action is at. Players have a limited amount of time to get the highest score possible. This is easy. There are three sub modes for score attack that matter: Single train, Regular and Extreme. In Single train it’s just the player vs one real ghost. The other three ghosts are not coloured in and can’t kill you but they do get in your way, possibly block your path and can easily ruin your chances of getting the high ranks. The real ghost is the can kill you if it’s angry which happens if you bump into them a few times in a row. As you zoom past minions, they join the real ghost and the ghost train grows. Make your ‘single’ ghost train grow as long as possible and then get the power pellet for the chance to score big. Regular is exactly the same except all the famous ghosts: Blinky, Pinky, Inky, Clyde are all real and there to eat you up. Extreme is just like Regular… but.. extreme. Ghosts get angry from being touched once, you have very little lives as well.
Extreme doesn’t sound like that much of a step up from Regular but the single ghost touch rules changes almost everything. When the ghosts are calm, they just move around, get in your way and follow you but when angry they act like they do in the original Pac-Man pretty much. Blinky will chase you down staying o your tail. Pinky will try to go ahead or alongside Pac-Man to try and cut him off. Inky will at times chase you down, like Blinky, or try to trap you like Pinky. Clyde will go wherever he wants, pretty much random. so anger ghosts as little as possible. Now Score attack is also for bragging rights as it’s there where you get ranked with grades from E to S. We are always honest so we must say this. If you get an E for any of these levels then put down your controller and slowly back away from the game and never play again. It’s that bad. D is for children and babies. C is people who’ve never played Pac-Man before or for your parents. B is for casual gamers. A is for skilful Pac-Man and pro wannabes. S is for the professionals. If you can get at least 10 S ranks then consider yourself a Pac-Man Championship Edition 2 legend. Only a few like X35 Earthwalker got an S for all the single train and Regular levels.
Getting an S requires players to play near perfectly. If you get killed once your chances of getting an S drastically lowers. So if you die, we recommend you retry. Find the path of the pellets (dots) for an easier level navigation. Build up the ghost trains as much as possible. Complete levels as fast as possible so that you can get the power pellet for the chance to score big. Some levels require more focus on time and ghost trains than the pellets and vice versa, so when you beat the level check the graph for a while to see where most of your score comes from and what adjustments you must make to get that grade. If you are feeling real competitive then take not of the global ranking. Players can see what rank they are on the global leader board for each level. For example in one of the levels, X35 Earthwalker was ranked in the top 15 of all Pac-Man Championship Edition 2 players around the world… and that was the level where he messed up right at the end so would have gotten a higher rank. Oh well. So yeah, playing score attack seriously can get incredibly tense, and down right frustrating when you are on a perfect run but some stupid ghosts get in the way and ruin everything for you. Worse the ghost trains come of their path ruining your chances of going to the next level fast.
Adventure is like Super Mario world map in terms of seeing from the top, moving from level to level, boss levels etc. It’s actually very simple. There’s ten levels. Each level requires players to eat a certain amount of fruits within a time limit. Off course, the amount of ghosts present, the amount of fruits required, the amount of power pellets, whether the fruits or power pellet moves all varies from level to level. Now there are three main difficulties to play each level on: Easy, Normal and pro. Pro is how it should be played as you have very little time and everything is fast. It pushes players to play perfectly getting them to that higher skill. It will help some players get good enough to get S grades in Score Attack. The main objective in Adventure is to collect stars. these stars are used to access the next boss and area. The amount of stars you get depend on the difficulty you play on. Easy gets one, Normal gets two and Pro gets three. Beating levels in easy works out only for the first area. Then the amount of stars required are more than what you get for completing all the levels on easy. It forces you to beat the levels on Normal. The next area requires even more and the last boss requires a huge amount of stars that it’s obvious that players must beat all the levels in pro difficulty to face it. The last level of each area is a boss ghost who is much larger than any other ghost. They always stay in the background and when you eat enough to summon the fruit or power pellet the boss always bites hard to turn all ghosts angry who then try to eat you. If you take too long to complete the stage then the boss automatically destroys you as well. So it’s only two game modes but both Score Attack and Adventure have a lot for players to dive into and they are challenging.
Time for some of the negatives about Pac-Man Championship Edition 2. Firstly we feel they are lacking in game mode variety. With so many past Pac-Man games, the developers could have easily created other game modes to keep things exciting longer. After all it’s just Score attack and Adventure. Not good enough. Second the levels in Adventure mode are basically the same. It’s always eat a certain number of fruits and that’s it. Sure some may require players to eat a power pellet to eat all the ghost within the time to get to the next maze which has the fruit but it’s all the same. Again it’s a lack of variety. There is so much more they could have done. Third is that multiple times the ghost trains will come of the paths which can easily mess up runs for S rank because they waste your time. host trains are suppose to and should stick to the clearly defined paths and never leave. Knowing you are about to eat a ghost train when all of a sudden they turn of the path and now you miss it and waste so much precious time is one of the worst feelings in this game. Fourth is that the bosses in Adventure mode so far (not sure about the last one yet) are lame. They just sit in the background and basically don’t do anything except for when you summon the fruit or run out of time. It’s honestly lame and a total let down.
Overall Pac-Man Championship Edition 2 is a great game. The two game modes can easily get players at the edge of their seats with how much you have to sit up and focus on what’s happening as it’s mainly fast paced gameplay. Replaying levels to get the S rank doesn’t get boring, you instantly know where you were lacking or went wrong and go straight in to do it again. The maze designs in some levels are awesome and the music forever stays a big factor for this game. Off course Pac-Man Championship Edition 2 has it’s negatives but it’s the best Pac-Man game in terms of pure Pac-Man gameplay which is eating pellets, fruits and ghosts. It’s truly worth playing if you are a Pac-Man fan. It’s still worth trying if you aren’t as this is a very good game indeed. Now Pac-Man may lots going on but not as much as… the ‘Earth Walk!’
Wizard of legend is a new fast paced dungeon crawler developed by ‘Contingent99‘. It’s coming out the 15th of May on the Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, PS4, Linux and PC. Lately there have been some good dungeon crawlers. Does this one fit that description? Let’s take a look.
The story in Wizard of Legend is very simple actually. Players control a wizard who’s goal is to overcome the chaos trials. Doing so they will become a wizard of Legend. That’s it. Just joking. Basically the council of magic holds the chaos trials every year in the kingdom of Lanova. The chaos trials are a gauntlet of magical challenges. So off course to become a wizard of legend, you must complete all the challenges and show your wizardly might.
In Wizard of Legend, players must fight their way through each challenge. Each challenge has dangerous and powerful conjured enemies who are more than willing to help you fail the trials. Wizard of Legend puts a lot of emphasis on speed. The dynamic magic combat requires players use spells quickly and fast magical attacks while keeping lots of mobility. So fast movement and fast spell casting. This sort of reminds us of DOOM, in terms of always moving.
There are different play styles thanks to the wide variety of spells. There is over 100 spells. That’s a lot. There are spells for fighting at a distance, spells for more close range, even speeds for summoning and having your minions fight for you. What’s better is that these spells can work in combinations and combos to some extent. So chain together spells that work well together. Do not forget mobility.
Awesome enough is that in Wizard of Legend, there is local co-op as well. This means open up your window and yell to your neighbour and tell them to come over and play. You both can take on the chaos trials together. This means now there are two play styles to take into consideration. Do you equip and use spells that create synergy between the to of you or do you forget about all that and both jump in head first and stand crushing enemies. In the case that you get crushed instead and downed, your partner has a chance to bring you back into the fight… but it won’t be easy.
Just to clear some things up yes you can play with your friend but you can also play against them as well. Last of all Wizard of Legend has full controller and gamepad support.
We checked out some gameplay of Wizard of Legend. Everything definitely fast paced. we are seeing dodges, slides, evasion, while casting many spells. This is the kind of action that we at X35 Earthwalker like. You have to stay on your feet. Some enemies use magical attacks of their own while others go melee. Different elemental attacks such as ice, fire, wind, lightning and more. This should make players wonder how hectic and crazy will fights get in PvP. Will some spells have an advantage over others like element type, recovery time, area of effect etc. Stuff to take into consideration. Probably the most coolest thing is that you can challenge and face the magic council members themselves who are at the height of magical powers.
Overall Wizard of Legend looks like a awesome game. It’s fun. fast paced, many enemies, many spells, many options, co-op and versus, mighty bosses, smooth gameplay and great graphics for it’s style. The music is good as well. The developers ‘Contingent99’ did an awesome job with this game. We at X35 Earthwalker are looking forward to Wizard of Legend. We hope that it delivers on what we have seen and know and more. Now the chaos trials have a big reward for those who win but that reward is nothing compared to the rewards of the… ‘Earth Walk!’
